New FCC Chairman Should Focus on Bipartisan Goals of National Broadband Plan

October 30, 2013

Last night, the Senate confirmed Tom Wheeler as FCC Chairman and Mike O’Rielly as FCC Commissioner, thus bringing the FCC to full strength. The following statement can be attributed to TechFreedom President Berin Szoka:

Incoming FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler and Commissioner Michael O’Rielly will find a ready-made telecom agenda awaiting them. The National Broadband Plan laid out an ambitious agenda of reforms with broad, bipartisan support: most notably, redirecting more spectrum to meet consumer demand, making it easier to build broadband networks, and facilitating the inevitable transition to all-IP networks.

Finally getting the FCC to focus on this opportunity will require prioritizing the agency’s limited staff resources and political capital on the core issues of spectrum management, broadband deployment and the IP Transition. That means accepting that the Department of Justice and Federal Trade Commission are well-equipped to police competition and consumer protection issues. This would de-politicize telecom policy by transferring what should be legal, not policy, issues to where they belong: with law enforcement agencies.

Three months ago, TechFreedom urged the Senate to quickly confirm both Wheeler and O’Rielly.

Tech Freedom is a non-profit, non-partisan technology think tank launched in 2011. TechFreedom is excited about the future. Focusing on issues of Internet freedom and technological progress, we work to protect innovation and discovery from powers that fear change. Technology is the great driver of social progress and human well-being, and we aim to keep it that way.